Tag: Fact

I wish I had been an orphan

~ Christi ~ 4 Comments

The past few months I’ve been reading the kids Lemony Snicket’s Series of Unfortunate Events. We just began book five, The Austere Academy. The kids are obsessed with it, and Geoff and I like it a lot, too. It’s dark and funny, with lots of big words. In other words, it’s awesome.

The stories are about three orphans, siblings whose parents died in a fire, who go on to have adventure after adventure. In each book the kids narrowly avoid a different disaster, and they regularly find themselves in situations that they never would have if their parents had survived.

When I was a kid I used to wish that my mom would die just so that I could have the kind of adventures that the Baudelaire orphans do. No, I didn’t actually want my mom to be dead, I just wanted my life to be more fun. If she died, I thought that I could go and live with my godmother, who seemed infinitely more interesting than my mom. I also wanted to live in an RV and travel around the country, something that was out of the question for my mom. Needless to say, my mom lived into my adulthood and I was at least seventeen before I ever had a real adventure.

My mom nearly gave me up for adoption – did I ever mention that? It’s a long story of its own, but when it came down to it, she changed her mind. She was single, poor, divorced, and unwed. She had little going for her in general, so when she found herself pregnant with me at 38, she first thought that adoption would be the best option. Then I was born two months early and my mom nearly died from complications. When things settled down, she decided that the universe had a message for her. She decided to take another stab at motherhood.

I’m glad that my mom did not give me up for adoption. I mean, I hope that goes without saying. I’m lucky in so many ways to have been raised by my mom. She gave me all that she had to give, and now I often wonder how she did it. Yet looking back, my life feels like a series of narrowly missed adventures. My childhood was safe and quiet, I went to college just 20 minutes from home, I got married at 23.

I’ve never been thrown to the wolves. I’ve never risked it all on my own in the world. I’ve never entrusted myself to the universe just for fun. Damn it, I want to.

 

I Don't Like Mondays Blog Hop

Good morning

~ Christi ~ 10 Comments

Nate woke me. “Guh mornin, Momma.” He stood by the bedside, smiling, reaching for me.

“Good morning, sweetie,” I answered. I closed my eyes again for just a minute, bracing myself. Then I climbed out of bed and slid my feet into my slippers. The window framed one of those heavy gray skies that show up in December and stick around until March, sometimes April.

I bounced down the stairs so the kids would know I’m happy to see them. Anna sat at the table gently tilting her new labyrinth game. “Mommy, I made it to 35!” she called.

“Cool!” I answered, hugging her.

I headed for the kitchen, searching for breakfast, coffee, more children. Both boys were heading down the back staircase, and Gabe grabbed Nate at the bottom for a hug and a kiss. That doesn’t happen every day. Next, Gabe came over and hugged me.

“Good morning, sweet boy,” I said and rubbed his super short hair. Nate wrapped his arms around me from the back.

From over by the coffee pot, Geoff turned and laughed. “Nate, did you just kiss Mommy’s tush?”

“Yeah,” he answered.

That’s when I knew it would be a good day.

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This week’s Trifecta Challenge includes the word tush. With three little kids, that’s everyday jargon at our house.

Spoilers suck

~ Christi

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I watched a movie with my in-laws this weekend. The movie was Elysium, with Matt Damon. Sci-fi with a tense, emotional plot. Good, but a bit predictable. Overall, you’d like it.

Now, watching with my in-laws is a different story. Geoff’s mom gets pretty emotional during movies. Within the first few minutes, she started up a chorus of “Mmm”s and “Oh”s. By the midway point, she was hiding under a blanket because of the violence. Near the end there was a minor twist that seemed obvious to me, but she clearly didn’t see it coming. “Oh my god!” she screamed when one character was stabbed, as if she had been hurt herself.

It was slightly amusing but distracting to watch with her. I kept thinking back to when I was a kid and my mom used to promise me that nothing on TV was real. “It’s all just pretend,” I wanted to tell her, but I didn’t. I actually felt way more sucked into the movie because of her reaction to it.

Then we had Geoff’s dad, the analyst, who about halfway through the movie announced the sequence of events leading up to the end. No, he’d never seen it before. But he totally called it. He was unaffected by the violence, not emotionally engaged with the plot at all. Cool and clear-headed—you should have seen him.

My in-laws have been married for a long time, 37 years this month. They are a great couple. Before this weekend though, I’ve often thought that they couldn’t be more different. They have different interests, different hobbies, different friends. They have completely different attitudes about most things. Watching the movie with them, it all clicked. They balance each other. One is emotional, the other intellectual. One is rational, the other irrational. Together, they complement each other. They fit together like pieces of a puzzle, and they experience life as a team.

Are all marriages like that? Does each person play a role, filling in for the other’s weaknesses, benefitting from their partner’s strengths? Is that how mine works? Maybe, but it’s more subtle than my in-laws’ relationship. I’d like to think that Geoff and I are a team, but we are also pretty good on our own.

I’m going to give this some more thought. And if you ever watch a movie with me, do not tell me how it ends. I hate that.

I Don't Like Mondays Blog Hop

My door is red

~ Christi

Did you know that Georgia O’Keefe chose her home in Abiquiu, New Mexico, because she liked a door in its courtyard? She saw the door, and she knew she needed to paint it despite the house being in ruins. It took her years to buy the home and renovate it, but she finally did. And she painted her door many times, in all sorts of different ways.

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I just finished reading Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. Have you read it? I liked it. He talks about the phenomenon of snap decisions, how they work, and their strengths and weaknesses. He briefly explains that our minds have a “locked door” between the conscious and unconscious. All the mechanics of our snap decisions lie behind the locked door of our minds, which he says, we can’t ever really know.

Not being able to know my own mind feels infuriating. Gladwell writes about a tennis coach, blessed with the ability to predict whenever a player will double fault a serve, who lies awake at night trying to figure out why he knows what he knows. Isn’t that just so true? I want to know how my mind works. I want to open my locked door, don’t you?

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In his conclusion, Gladwell writes, “the key to good decision making is not knowledge. It is understanding. We are swimming in the former. We are desperately lacking in the latter.” Knowledge and understanding. Knowledge is an accessible set of facts, it’s what we find when we Google something, when we do our research. Understanding implies a relationship to that knowledge, a comprehension of it. Knowledge is easy to find, understanding takes time. Knowledge takes action, understanding takes patience.

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I’m thinking of Georgia O’Keefe painting her courtyard door over and over again. Was she trying to create the perfect door? No. She was giving her unconscious a place to express itself. She was seeing what her door could produce. It’s true that we can’t ever know the mechanics lying behind our locked doors. Even the most intensive psychotherapy only offers the opportunity to watch ourselves and see what we do. What actions arise from our unconscious? Is there a pattern to the output? In the absence of facts – of knowledge – understanding comes from watching the door and seeing what we can create from it.

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I like to get messy too

~ Christi ~ 7 Comments

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFpe3Up9T_g

Anna has been hiding her dirty laundry.

Every morning lately she’s been melting down when it comes time to get dressed for school. “Mom, I can’t find any pants!” she yells, like I’m keeping them from her. Usually she finds some, never mind that they are too short and seasonally inappropriate – or on the third day of wear. The important thing is that she learns to fend for herself, right?

In the evening, while I’m watching reruns and folding laundry, everyone ends up with a stack of clean clothes. Except Anna. Without fail, her pile will have just a pair of socks and a t-shirt while everybody else’s clothes tower over me. Against my better judgment, I checked her closet last week – maybe she shoved her dirty things in there. But no, the closet was relatively clean. I should have worried, but I didn’t.

Anna has always been hopelessly, even hilariously, disorganized. When she was a toddler, she would fill every available tote bag with her toys and hang them all on her toy stroller, carting it all over the house. We used to call her the bag lady. Last winter, one of my new year’s resolutions was to help Anna learn to organize her toys. I bought her a bunch of cute little colorful bins, and made chalkboard labels for each one. She had so much fun labeling and organizing her toys. It worked great for about two weeks, and then we promptly forgot all about organizing. Honestly, I’m happy when the toys make it into any bin at all. I don’t mind if she makes a mess when she’s playing.

So this morning, I was trying to find a few more items to fill up my laundry basket. I wandered into her room, thinking that I would grab her pajamas from the floor. Then I noticed a bin on the floor by the window. It had a pair of dirty leggings in it, along with some doll clothes. So, I grabbed the leggings and peeked in another bin. It looked like it was full of trash. I pushed the trash aside and underneath I found a bunch of dirty nightgowns. Then I turned and noticed a gift bag, full of dirty t-shirts and even a piece of my jewelry!

Needless to say, I am really glad that I checked her bins. God only knows where all of her toys are. And I was just about to buy her some new pants.

 

What’s yours is mine

~ Christi ~ 4 Comments

So, remember a couple of weeks ago when I mentioned that Geoff might be getting fired? Well, it’s happening. Only, he’s getting laid off, with what will most likely be a big severance package. And – here’s the really funny part – he already has a new job. No kidding. He got the offer letter last week and he’s accepting it today. He even gets a big, fat signing bonus.

I know, I know. I sound awful. It’s not that I don’t feel lucky for this good fortune. I do. It’s not that I’m not happy for Geoff, because I am. Like I said before, he works hard. I’m glad that he has a great reputation that travels well. I’m excited for him for this new opportunity. Truly, I think everything will work out for the best for him.

But I’m jealous. I want what Geoff has. I want the recognition, the extra pay, the opportunity. I want an easy transition to my next phase of life. More than that, I want the necessity. Why would it be so much easier for me if I needed to do it for money?

Geoff did make me an offer yesterday. He promised to help out with the kids over the next few months before he starts the new job so I can work on my writing. He told me to take some of the extra money and hire a sitter during the day so I can write. He said something about being my benefactor. I’m thrilled and scared. Of course I’m taking him up on it.

Oh, and have I mentioned how much I love him?

Bring your egg in

~ Christi ~ 1 Comment

Last night I had a hilarious conversation with my friends. We were out at dinner, sharing dim sum, and we started talking about working out. Working out led to horror stories about the Jillian Michael’s DVD Ripped in 30. (Most of my friends and I have suffered through it, have you?) Horror stories about trying to do a sit up. “Can you touch your foot? I can’t get past my knee!” More nightmares about the duck walk.

And then one friend mentioned how much she hates the background music. “But I like how Jillian makes up little motivational sayings,” she said.

“Like what?” I asked.

“Like when she says, ‘Bring your egg in,’” she laughed.

“Wait – do you mean ‘Bring your A-game?’” I asked, and we all burst out laughing. For about ten minutes.

I’m still trying to imagine what my friend thought of when she heard “Bring your egg in.” Are we farmers? Was it a jab at us stay-at-home moms who are too lazy to bring in the groceries? What? I don’t know. But it sure did make us laugh.

Now that I’m thinking about it, Jillian Michaels is incredibly motivating. First of all, she’s hot. You know, she follows her own advice. Plus she’s complicated. She’s mean and nice at the same time. She’s reminding you how awesome you are for showing up at the same time that she’s pushing you to work harder than you think you can. She is right there, in your face, kicking your ass. Killing you. She’s right, though, getting out of your comfort zone does make you stronger. It’s not just about getting in shape, it’s about life. Go take responsibility for whatever it is that you want and then go get it.

Go bring your egg in.

Did you know that I used to live on a mountain?

~ Christi ~ 26 Comments

You might not believe it, considering that I now live in the Midwest, in flat Plains territory, where my kids think that the sledding hill is a mountain. Oh, they have no clue.

Way back when, before the kids were in the picture, Geoff convinced me to move to a log home on top of a mountain. We lived in Virginia back then, where there are a few respectable mountains. We had some friends who lived on top of one of them. The first time we visited them was an initiation. We grew up in suburbia. I, for one, had never seen a switchback. Have you? Well, that first time, armed with our friends’ instructions, Geoff finally got to test out the low-four-wheel drive on our new SUV. He was psyched. I was scared – no, terrified – on the way up, and I threatened to get out of the car. But we made it up the four switchbacks, found our friends’ beautiful house, and spent the afternoon admiring the view of the fields below.

Then it came time to leave. Going down the mountain frightened me even more than driving up. We literally could not see the road in front of the car. I’m pretty sure that I kept my eyes closed the whole way down. By the time we reached the main road I was glad that it was all over.

Less than a year later, we bought the house across the road from our friends. We made the decision to move impetuously, for us. We sold our townhouse and bought a log home, and the whole thing happened in just a few weeks. It’s a blur, but I remember that Geoff wanted it and I wanted it for him. I wanted it for us. It was the beginning of a six-year-long adventure.

That first day, that afternoon when I followed the moving truck from tidy suburbia past the horse farms, past all signs of civilization, to our new home in the woods, I took a deep breath as I reached the bottom of the mountain. I was scared but I did it anyway. I can clearly remember the adrenaline rushing through my body as I steered the car up those switchbacks. I reached the mostly flat gravel road at the top. I drove slowly, the view my prize for risking my life. Then, just like that, I was home.

We lived in that home until our daughter turned one. I drove up and down the mountain hundreds of times. Yet I never got used to it. For years, as I drove the winding road leading to those switchbacks, my heart would race. Every single time those switchbacks made me nervous. Every day the mountain was new to me.

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The view from our deck
The flat part of the road
The flat part of the road

Thanks, Samantha, for inspiring me last week with your post about adjusting to change.

I think I want to join the military

~ Christi

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I like adventure. I want to travel.

I’m not afraid of a little danger. I like to be tested.

I’m good at following directions. I know my place. I respect authority.

I want to help people who need it, and I want to make the world a better, safer place.

I want to be a hero for my kids. I want them to know what I’m capable of.

I want respect for what I do.

I like cold, hard, gritty reality.

I think I’m tough enough to pull it off. What do you think?